


there's a room where the light won't find you

by connorswhisk



Series: losers/lovers [1]
Category: IT - Stephen King
Genre: Character Study, F/M, also i hate billverly but it's essential to bill's character so i just went with it, the major character death is for georgie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-21
Updated: 2019-09-21
Packaged: 2020-10-25 13:00:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20724605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/connorswhisk/pseuds/connorswhisk
Summary: ~~When Bill is four years old, he gets hit by a car.When Bill is five years old, he meets some of his best friends in the whole world.When Bill is thirteen years old, his entire world comes crashing down.~~





	there's a room where the light won't find you

**Author's Note:**

> this whole thing is just a giant merge of every it canon to exist. mostly based on the movies, but there's a lot of elements lifted from the book.
> 
> title taken from everybody wants to rule the world by tears for fears

When Bill is four years old, he gets hit by a car.

Mommy takes him out for ice cream sometimes after she picks up her medicine at the drug store, and so Bill is going with her today, skipping along and giggling at the jokes Mommy makes about the birds in the trees, and the funny voice she does when she’s pretending to be Bugs Bunny. They reach the crosswalk downtown, almost to Mr. Keene’s store, and Bill is so excited that he runs ahead.

He’s running to cross the road, and Mommy is laughing and saying, _Billy, slow down. Come back here and hold my hand! _He yells back, _No, Mommy, I’m a big boy! I can do it myself!, _and before she can say anything else, he’s skipping into the street without looking both ways like he’s supposed to, and then there’s the screech of tires, and a scream, and then -

Well, then Bill gets hit.

He can’t remember much after the fact. He wakes up in a hospital bed with his parents hovering over him, his mother weeping, his father pale. He’s covered in bandages, and his body aches, a dull, thumping ache. But at least he’s alive.

He opens his mouth to say something, and Mommy embraces him in a bone-crushing hug before he can get the words out.

“One of your arms is broken, and you have a concussion,” a doctor explains to Bill. “But you’re going to be just fine, William. Just fine.”

Bill nods. “You can call me B-B-Bi-Bill,” he says, and he suddenly feels _scared_. He almost couldn’t say his name. Why couldn’t he say his name right? He _knows_ his name, he didn’t forget it after the accident, so why did it take so long for him to get out?

“W-W-W-Why can’t I t-talk?” Bill asks fearfully, eyes feeling a little wet even as he says it. His mother is starting to cry again, and Daddy turns to the doctor.

“What’s wrong with him?” he demands. “Why’s he stuttering like that?” The doctor shakes his head, surprised.

“Sometimes a slight stutter can be a side effect of a severe concussion. I wasn’t expecting this, but it’s perfectly normal, I assure you. Chances are it’ll go away within a month or two, and then it’ll be like it was never there at all.”

The doctor is wrong. Bill stutters for a long time. And it isn’t a slight stutter, either. It’s bad, obvious, and sometimes when he gets really nervous, it happens on every word.

Bill hates it.

He goes to a speech therapist, but it doesn’t really do much. He tries different techniques, different exercises, but they never seem to help. They never seem to help, but Bill tries them anyway. They never seem to help, but Bill repeats the words like a mantra in his head.

_He thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts._

People make fun of it. The other kids at the daycare, and the kids at the playground. Bill goes trick-or-treating as a ghost, and even though they can’t see his face, the adults who answer the door to hear him stammer a, “T-t-trick-or-treat!” still stifle chuckles.

It seems like the only people who don’t care about Bill’s stutter are Mommy and Daddy. They ignore it, and don’t draw attention to it. When Bill gets stuck on a word, they wait patiently for him to get it out instead of finishing his sentence, like the teacher at daycare. When he finally manages to get the word out, they smile and tell him he’s doing a great job.

They’re the best parents any kid could ask for, Bill thinks.

He doesn’t learn how wrong he is for a long time.

When Bill is five years old, he meets some of his best friends in the whole world.

It’s not like he didn’t have friends before, because he did. None of them were _best friend _material, and Bill didn’t play with them _a lot, _but he doesn’t know what he would call them other than friends. There was Simon from next door, and Davey from daycare, and sometimes he would play hide and seek with Travis if he saw him at the playground. They were his friends, sure.

But ever since they all started kindergarten, they haven’t really been his friends anymore. Simon moved away, and Davey hangs out with the boys who like to play soccer on the field outside, and Bill doesn’t like to play soccer, ‘cause he prefers baseball. And Travis is the worst of all, because on the first day of school he had laughed at Bill’s stutter, even though he’d never done that before.

Bill loses Travis on the first day of kindergarten, but he _gains_ Eddie.

Eddie Kaspbrak is a very small boy. He always takes a lot of different-colored pills at lunchtime, and he doesn’t have to run in gym because he has asthma. He’s snarky, way too careful about things, and he goes from perfectly calm to yelling in a matter of seconds.

And he’s Bill’s first best friend.

Eddie introduces himself on the first day, during recess. Bill is sitting on his own on the swings, trying not to think about how he’d stuttered badly during his class introduction, and how Travis had laughed along with almost everyone else. He’s running over his words inside his head

_He thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts. He thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts. He thrusts -_

and -

“Who are you talking to?” a voice asks. Bill jumps slightly, and sees Eddie sitting in the swing next to him.

“Sorry,” Eddie says. “I didn’t mean to scare you. But you were talking to yourself.”

“Oh,” Bill says, blushing a little. “I g-g-guess I thought I was s-s-saying it in m-my head.”

“Well, you weren’t,” Eddie says bluntly. “Anyway, I’m Eddie. You’re Bill, right?”

Bill nods. Eddie smiles. “Cool.”

“N-n-nice to meet you,” Bill says politely. Eddie ignores this.

“What _were_ you saying, anyway?”

Bill flushes. “Oh, it w-w-was nothing. Just an e-exercise for my s-st-stutter.” He cringes at the words.

“Really?” Eddie asks. “That’s cool, how does it go?”

Bill blinks. No one’s ever cared about his stuttering exercise enough to want to hear it. For a second he thinks Eddie might be playing a joke on him, but his eyes look curious, and like they actually want to learn.

So Bill tells him the line, stammering through it a little, but better than he’s done all day. Maybe even better than he’s done _ever._ And Eddie nods along, and then asks Bill if he thinks Batman or Superman is more awesome, and by the time the bell rings to go back inside, Eddie and Bill are laughing together. The next day they sit together at lunch without even having to think about it.

They never flat-out say to each other, “We’re friends.” The thought just passes between them. Bill thinks it was supposed to. They’re meant to be friends with each other, however corny it may sound.

“My mom doesn’t think I should come to school,” Eddie says one day at lunch. Bill looks up from peeling his orange.

“Wh-why not?” Bill asks. Eddie shrugs, picking at his crustless ham and cheese sandwich.

“I don’t know, ‘cause my dad said that I should and she agreed with him. I guess now that he’s gone my mom’s having second thoughts. Which is stupid, because it’s not like we’re doing anything dangerous. I don’t have to do anything in gym ‘cause of my asthma, and I only hang out with you, not any of the reckless kids.”

Bill has only heard the word _reckless _a few times before, from his parents. He thinks it’s funny that Eddie uses it.

“Wh-who’s reckless, Eddie?” Bill asks. Eddie rolls his eyes.

“Any of the kids who play sports. Also, Greta Keene, because she’s a bully. And...” He pauses, surveying the room thoughtfully before his eyes fix on a spot behind Bill. “Richie Tozier,” Eddie says, dislike obvious in his voice.

“What’s so b-bad about R-R-Richie?” Bill turns around in his seat, following Eddie’s stare. Richie Tozier is currently shoving carrot sticks up his nose and making a sound like a walrus, to the laughter of the rest of the table of boys. The only person who isn’t laughing is Stanley Uris, who’s sitting to Richie’s right and looking at him warily.

“Bill, he’s _disgusting_,” Eddie says, curling his lips slightly. “I don’t know _how _Stanley puts up with him.” Richie whips the sticks out of his nose, then takes a huge, theatrical bite out of them, to the excitement of the boys watching and to the sheer disappointment of Stanley, who puts his face in his hands.

Eddie gags. “Eeeeew. Oh, gross. Ew.” Bill laughs.

“Maybe we sh-should make friends with him.” Eddie stares at Bill in disbelief. “I-I’m serious, Eddie. He’s p-p-probably not that bad, if St-Stanley hangs out with him.”

“I _guess,_” Eddie says doubtfully.

“C-Come on, it’ll be f-f-fun,” Bill says, and as soon as school ends he’s dragging Eddie outside to where Richie and Stanley are waiting on the playground.

“Stuttering Bill!” Richie yells loudly, causing Eddie to jump slightly. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Hey,” Eddie snaps. “Don’t call him that.” Richie blinks at him, a slow smile spreading across his face.

“I-It’s ok, Eddie,” Bill says. “I d-d-don’t mind.” He really doesn’t. Even though Richie’s a jokester, something in his tone tells Bill that he didn’t mean the remark in a rude way.

“Edward!” Richie says. “What’s up?”

Eddie scowls. “Nothing. Shut up.”

“Aw, you’re no fun, Eds,” Richie says, pretending to cry. Eddie looks like he’s about to start screaming at Richie, so Bill intervenes, turning to Stanley.

“W-We were just wondering if y-you guys maybe wanted to h-h-hang out,” he says. “You know. L-Like f-f-friends.”

Stanley blinks. He looks surprised, like he hadn’t expected anyone else to want to be friends with them.

“Um...,” Stanley says. He looks at Richie.

“Sure!” he says. “Sounds fun!”

“Yeah,” Stanley says, smiling softly. “Sounds fun.”

Bill grins. Richie cheers and throws an arm around Eddie’s shoulders, much to Eddie’s dismay. And while it had seemed like it might not have worked out at first, Bill looks back and knows that making friends with Richie and Stanley had been one of the best decisions of his life.

When Bill is six years old, Georgie is born.

At first, Bill is skeptical when his parents tell him that he’s going to be a big brother. He almost isn’t sure what to think. A little sibling? Why would he need one? Bill’s perfectly fine with the way things are, just him and Mom and Dad living together, eating dinner together and telling each other how their days have been. Another member of the family will throw off their rhythm. It’ll change them.

“Oh, Billy,” his mother says. “Don’t worry about it. Our family isn’t changing, it’s just _expanding_.”

Bill isn’t so sure about that.

Especially when his parents keep on going on and _on _about the new baby, and what it’s name will be, and if it will be a boy or a girl, and blah, blah, blah. It seems like they’re always leaving Bill with a sitter or at a friend’s house so they can go shopping for baby stuff, or they’re talking to relatives over the phone about the baby, or they’re making sure all the sharp edges and corners of the house are covered up for the baby, and baby, baby, baby.

Bill decides, four months before his mother is due, that he doesn’t want a little sibling. And that he’ll probably hate the one he gets.

“You shouldn’t say that,” Stanley says one day as they’re walking out of school. “You don’t know that you’ll hate him. It is a him, right?”

Bill nods, adjusting his backpack on his shoulders. “Y-Yeah, it’s a b-boy. And how would you kn-know I won’t hate him, St-Stan? You don’t have a s-s-sibling, so you d-don’t know how it f-f-feels.”

Stanley shrugs, carefully taking his bike from the rack. He pops the kickstand and says: “I _don’t_ know. But you don’t, either.”

“He’s right, Big Bill,” Richie points out, yanking his bike out and banging it against the rack in the process. “Of course, Stan’s a know-it-all, and he’s wrong a lot of the time, so you might be better off not listening to him.”

“Wish _I_ didn’t have to listen to _you_,” Eddie responds. “I can only take so much of your big mouth before I need a break so I don’t kill you.”

Richie’s eyes widen comically. “Eddie Spaghetti gets off a good one! Real good chucks, Eds.”

“Don’t call me that,” Eddie snaps. He turns to Bill. “Do you know what your parents want to name him?”

“G-G-George. If it was a g-girl, they would’ve n-named her K-Katherine.”

“I like those names,” Eddie says thoughtfully. “They’re good names. Do you think so, Bill?” He looks at Bill almost like he’s asking for approval, like he’s pleading for Bill to agree with him.

“I d-d-don’t know,” Bill grumbles, mounting his bike. Silver, his trusty steed. “I guess. Can we ch-cha-change the subject?”

“Sure thing, Bill,” Eddie says, and then Richie launches into a discussion about some new horror movie playing at the Aladdin, and how he wants to try and sneak in. Bill pedals quietly behind the others, listening to Eddie and Richie squabbling and Stanley occasionally offering his own input to the conversation. Bill wishes he could worry about sneaking into a theater instead of what he’s actually thinking about, but the thought just won’t go away.

They reach the corner of Jackson and Witcham. Stan and Richie go one way, Eddie another, Bill a third. He says goodbye and then pushes himself forward on Silver, letting the slope of the big hill between the corner and his house propel him forward as he glides down the street, weaving in and out and letting the wind blow his hair back in his face. It’s moments like these, where he’s riding as fast as the Lone Ranger, that he feels the most free.

“HI-YO, SILVER, AWAY!” Bill yells, grinning to himself as he zooms down the road until he reaches his driveway. He sets his bike down with some idea of rushing inside to tell his mother all about his day. But when he gets to the kitchen, Mom is on the phone with Grandma about the baby _again, _and Bill has no choice but to sit and wait for her to finish.

Bill knows, no matter what Stanley says, that he’s going to hate George.

He’s wrong, of course. Stan’s usually right.

On a rainy day in September, Bill is dropped off at Richie’s house, where he sits and reads comics for hours and hours on end while he waits for his parents to call him from the hospital. It seems to take forever. Stanley and Eddie come over for a slumber party, but Bill hardly pays any attention to them, jittery with anticipation.

Finally, in the middle of dinner, the phone rings.

“It’s for you, Bill,” Mrs. Tozier says, even though Bill had known it had been before she even picked it up. He stands up from his seat and takes the phone from Richie’s mom, heart pounding in his chest.

“H-Hello?” he asks tentatively.

“Bill!” his father says. He sounds happy, but tired. “Your mother’s asleep right now, but George is here! You’re a big brother, Bill!”

And although Bill knew this was coming, he still has to swallow a lump in his throat. “That’s g-g-great, Dad.”

His dad laughs. “Isn’t it? I can’t wait for you to meet him, Billy. You’re just gonna love him.”

“Yeah, I b-bet,” Bill says, and then he passes the phone to Mr. Tozier, who starts congratulating his father loudly. Eddie and Richie and Stan grin at Bill as he sits back down. He offers a weak smile back. He hopes it doesn’t look as hollow as he feels.

Bill goes and stays with Grandma for a few days after his mother has George. He would’ve rather stayed at Richie’s (Richie would’ve liked it and Bill honestly doesn’t think that Mr. and Mrs. Tozier would care), but Dad said that would be “imposing.”

Three days after George is born, Mom and Dad come to Grandma’s. Bill’s father looks tired, and his mother has dark circles under her eyes, but they’re smiling all the same. Grandma coos when she takes George in her arms, laughing at his big eyes and chubby face.

Bill gets a quick glance at the new baby, but mostly stays in the living room and draws pictures of his friends. He makes sure to draw Eddie a fannypack around his waist, and to give Richie big glasses, and Stan squiggly hair. While he does, he thinks to himself

_He thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts._

“Bill,” Mom says, sitting next to him on the couch. Dad and Grandma are still talking in the kitchen. “Do you want to hold your brother?”

Bill blinks slowly. “He’ll c-c-cry.”

“I don’t think he will, not if you’re gentle with him.”

“D-Do I have to?” Bill asks. His mother smiles, though she looks confused.

“Why wouldn’t you?” she asks.

Bill shrugs. “Ok.”

He gently lifts the bundle of blankets from her arms, careful not to move too fast or too recklessly. It’s heavier than he expected it to be. He slowly rests back on the couch and looks down into the face of his brother, thinking: _I am not going to like you._

George stares up at him with huge, curious blue eyes. Bill stares back, just as curious.

“Isn’t he adorable?” Mom asks.

He _is. _He’s the most adorable thing Bill has ever seen in his life. He hadn’t thought so before, but now that he’s here, and he’s holding George in his arms, he knows that it’s a fact.

“Yeah,” Bill says, wondering. He lifts a finger to gently poke at George’s cheek. George gurgles.

“Hey, G-George. I’m your big b-b-brother, Bill,” he says. A fat little hand emerges from inside the blankets, and grasps at Bill’s finger. George smiles.

“Oh, _Billy_,” Mom says happily. “You made him smile for the first time.”

Bill smiles back at the small form in his arms. When his brother had grabbed his finger, Bill had realized that Stanley had been right.

“I love you, G-Georgie,” Bill whispers. And the words are true.

When Bill is nine years old, he meets Beverly Marsh.

Well, he doesn’t first meet her then. He met her a while ago, when they were in the first grade. But he hadn’t really seen her, not then.

Now, they’re in the third grade. Bill had been joking around when he’d said he was going to audition for the school play. Now, he’s actually in it, much to his own dismay and Richie’s glee.

“Holy crap, Bill, you got the lead?” Richie asks, grinning from ear to ear. “That’s _hilarious_, dude, we’ve all gotta come see you perform!”

Bill groans. “It w-was an accident, I swear. I d-d-didn’t want to be in it for real, but Mrs. F-Ferguson said I was good and she wants m-me to be the main g-g-guy.”

“Oh, _boo-hoo_, Bill,” Richie says sarcastically, flinging his bike to the ground and following Bill up the walk to Eddie’s door. “You were talented enough to get in, and now you have to do it, whether you were joking or not.”

“I kn-know,” Bill says, ringing the doorbell. “I just wish I h-hadn’t done that. I’m going to m-make a fool of myself up there with my st-st-stutter.”

“Come on, everyone already knows you’ve got it. Nobody will care.”

Bill opens his mouth to protest, but before he can say anything, the door is wrenched open.

Mrs. Kaspbrak is not a nice woman. Bill knows that he should treat all adults with respect, and he _does_, but just because he’s respectful towards them doesn’t mean he has to like them. And Bill does _not _like Eddie’s mom.

“What do you want?” she demands. Her hair is up in curlers, and she’s holding her nails out in front of her delicately to dry. In the background, the TV blares. Clearly, they’ve just interrupted her.

“Well, hello to you too, Mrs. K!” Richie says. Bill resists the urge to punch him in the arm, just to get him to shut up.

“W-We’re here for Eddie, M-Mrs. Kaspbrak,” Bill says politely. She sniffs, then leans back into the house to yell: “Eddie-bear! Those _boys_ are here!”

Eddie quickly emerges from the dark house and steps outside. Richie grins.

“They’re my friends, Mommy,” Eddie says. “Can I go out and play?”

Mrs. Kaspbrak hums disapprovingly. “Have you finished all your chores?”

“Yes, Ma,” Eddie says. “I finished them a while ago.”

“Well, I _guess _you can go play. But don’t you go doing anything dangerous. And be back by six, Eddie-bear.”

“Thank you, Mommy,” Eddie says, and kisses her on the cheek.

“Don’t worry, Mrs. K,” Richie says. “We’ll make sure not to take good ol’ Eds to the wrong side of the tracks.”

“Beep-_beep_, Richie,” Eddie grumbles, shoving him and Bill down the steps. “Come on, let’s go.”

Eddie also thinks it’s funny that Bill’s in the play, and even _Stan _cracks a smile. Bill knows it was a mistake, but he can’t go back now. Unfortunately.

But, surprisingly enough, he actually has fun. The rehearsals aren’t so bad, even though the story is corny and he’s going to have to wear some stupid, frilly costume on the night of the show. But all that’s worth it because of Beverly.

Bill hadn’t even realized that Beverly was going to be the other lead, and he had first thought she wouldn’t be good. Beverly is kind of quiet. She keeps to herself a lot, and doesn’t really have any friends. But when she steps onto the stage, all that goes away. She’s loud, and vibrant, and really _passionate _about what she’s doing. She seems to become a whole new person when she’s performing.

Or maybe, Bill realizes, this person has been there all along. Beverly just never saw a reason to let her out.

They get teased for playing characters who are in love with each other, but Bill and Beverly don’t really care. Bill gets to know her, _really _know her. She’s funny, and nice, and her hair is really pretty, and her eyes are a deep, deep blue, and she’s the first crush Bill has ever had.

Wow. He has a _crush. _On _Beverly Marsh._

Wow.

But, despite all of this, she never plays with Bill and his friends on the playground. She doesn’t sit with them at lunch. She doesn’t hang out with them after school. She never asks to.

Bill never asks her if she wants to, either. He doesn’t know why.

Deep down, for some crazy reason, he thinks the timing isn’t right.

The night of the play is intense. Mrs. Ferguson’s freaking out, the kids are freaking out, _everyone _is freaking out. One of the boys is sick and someone has to fill in for him, and Beverly’s dress tears near the bottom before she even goes onstage, requiring someone to patch it up. It seems like the play will be a disaster.

But it isn’t.

Everything runs smoothly. No one forgets their lines, and none of the set pieces break. Bill stutters a lot, but it doesn’t even sound that bad. In fact, it’s the least insecure Bill has felt about his stutter in a long time.

When Bill and Beverly have their final big romantic scene at the end, with just the two of them onstage, something happens. Something sort of..._sparks._ Bill delivers his lines, Beverly says hers, and at the end of it, even though it wasn’t part of the blocking, even though _no one _is telling them to do it, they kiss.

(Richie wolf-whistles loudly from the crowd.)

And Bill _likes _it. It feels a little weird, and it’s not, by any means, a particularly long kiss, but it makes his stomach jump around like a jackrabbit, and when he pulls away he’s blushing. Beverly is, too, and she’s looking at Bill with wonder in her eyes.

The curtains close, and the play is over.

Bill is immediately swarmed by his family, holding flowers and grinning at him. His parents look a little dumb-founded, but they’re still happy for him. Georgie bounds up and leaps into his brother’s arms, peppering his face with kisses and shouting, “Billy, you were _awesome!”_

Richie is next, clapping Bill on the back and raising his eyebrows suggestively (“Big Bill, you sly dog!”). Then Eddie, smiling wide (“That was so good, Bill, but don’t you think kissing is a little unsanitary? I mean, all those germs - “), and then Stanley, grinning genuinely (“Great job. That was really good.”)

And while Bill loves the praise, loves his family, loves his friends, he finds himself looking over their shoulders, searching the crowd for a familiar head of red hair. And when he finds her, she’s leaving, all on her own.

No one had come to see Beverly perform.

Bill wishes he could’ve had the chance to tell her how good of a job she did. He doesn’t say it at school. He doesn’t even talk to her anymore, now that the play is over. There’s another divide between them, for some reason.

But maybe they can bridge it, someday. When the timing’s right.

When Bill is thirteen years old, his entire world comes crashing down.

The funeral is quiet. Well-attended, but quiet. It doesn’t rain, not like in the movies. It’s sunny, a perfectly clear blue sky.

How? How can it be so beautiful on the day of something so terrible?

There is no body to bury. There hadn’t been one to find. Bill can’t tell if it’s better or worse that way.

His friends come. They’re all crying, even Richie. Because Georgie had been a familiar face for them. A ray of bright sunshine on a cloudy day.

And now he’s gone.

The house is empty when they get home, or maybe it just feels that way. No one is sitting in front of the TV, playing with his toy cars. No little boy is going to come running in through the back door, gushing about what he learned in school today. No younger brother is going to beg Bill to play with him anymore.

The house is a shell of what it used to be when Georgie had been there. Bill doesn’t dare go in his room.

Hadn’t this been what he’d wanted, once upon a time? A family of just his mother, his father, and himself? No little siblings to steal his thunder, no one to take the attention away from him?

Bill feels sick at the thought.

The whole thing is his fault. He should’ve just gone out with Georgie that day, instead of staying in like he so selfishly had. He’d lied. He hadn’t been sick, he just hadn’t felt like playing with Georgie. He’d been tired, the rain hadn’t made him particularly excited about the prospect of going outside, and yet he’d still allowed Georgie to go out on his own.

The rational side of Bill’s brain says that, no, it can’t be his fault. There was no way of knowing what would happen to Georgie that day. And would Bill have even been able to stop whatever had happened if he’d been there?

_Yes, _the guilty side says, the side that keeps Bill up at night and makes him gasp until he buries his face in his pillow to stifle the sobs. _You could’ve. You were his big brother. He would’ve listened to you. He would’ve done anything you told him to. He would’ve gone to the ends of the earth for you. He would’ve _died _for you._

Isn’t that what he’d done?

His parents don’t make it any better. His father has become stone-faced, a wall of silence. He doesn’t talk much besides the obligatory “good mornings” and “good nights.” Mom is worse. She’s so fragile, a woman on the verge of collapse. She breaks down at the slightest mention of Georgie’s name, and even the mere memory of him causes her to burst into tears. One moment she’ll be fine, asking Bill how his day has gone, the next she’ll be weeping into her mashed potatoes while Dad looks on somberly.

His dad doesn’t notice, but Bill knows that his mother blames him for everything, just like he blames himself. She never tells him that, never outright accuses him of anything, but Bill knows she will never forgive him for letting Georgie out by himself that day.

Bill wishes he could go back in time. Wishes that he could fix all this, that he could be there for Georgie. That he could protect him. That he could trade his life for his little brother’s.

And there’s still the crazy part of him that says: _What if he’s still out there? What if he just fell down into the drain, and the storm washed him someplace else. What if he just blew away? He could be alive. He could be in the Barrens._

Bill holds onto these thoughts, however insane they might be. Because he can’t give up, he _won’t_. Not yet. And when he cries, it’s not as much as he could. Because he hopes, he hopes, he hopes.

He drags the others to the Barrens. Splashes through tons of shitty fucking greywater just on the off-chance that he might find something. A clue to where Georgie’s hiding.

He doesn’t. His father tells him to stop, stop before Mom finds out. Bill almost wants her to. Because then they’ll talk to him. They’ll be mad at him, distraught even, but they’ll talk to him, and they’ll notice him, and they’ll fucking acknowledge his presence. They may have lost one son, but they still have Bill. They still have him, they still have him, they still have him. They still have Bill.

But the more time that goes by - the more time Bill takes to go out looking for a shred, a piece, something, _anything _that he can find left of his little brother - he learns to accept the fact that his stutter isn’t the only thing being ignored anymore.

Georgie comes home.

But not in the way Bill wanted him to.

Georgie’s bedroom is the same as it’s always been. No one has touched any of his belongings. They’ve all avoided the room like the plague. Bill realizes, with a pang in his chest, that there are still clothes strewn about on the floor, never picked up by their owner.

The desk is still covered in toys and photographs. There’s one of Georgie on Bill’s back, on the day that they went to the waterpark two towns over. There’s one of Georgie with Mom. One of his school pictures is hanging on the wall. There’s a set of jacks, and a clock with a train on it, but for some reason Bill reaches for the Lego turtle. He can’t explain why.

He’s crying, he realizes. Not as much as he could be. But he is.

Something crackles. Bill glances up. A shadow moves across the wall.

_No..._

The turtle smashes against the floor. Bill can’t believe what he’s seeing.

The basement is still flooded. The water looks deeper than it should, like Bill could step in and sink down, down, down, and never come up. But the glint of the yellow slicker is unmistakable, and he continues down the stairs, as if in a trance.

“G-Georgie?” he whispers. He must be dreaming, he must.

“Billy,” Georgie says back, and it’s him, it’s really him.

Bill exhales. “Georgie,” he says. His throat sticks. “_G-G-Georgie._”

“My boat,” Georgie says. “It floated away. Just floated away, into the sewers. I couldn’t make it stop.”

“It’s ok,” Bill says. “You c-can come home n-n-now, Georgie.”

“But Billy,” Georgie says back, a lilt in his voice, and Bill suddenly understands that something is very _wrong. _“If you come with me, you’ll float, too.”

And his voice is rising, crescendoing, getting louder and louder with every word: “_YOU’LL FLOAT, TOO! YOU’LL FLOAT, TOO! YOU’LL FLOAT, TOO! YOU’LL FLOAT, TOO!”_

He’s changing, crumbling, and there’s something in the water below him, something evil, something _bad_ -

“G-Georgie,” Bill mumbles, horrified. And then the thing is racing towards him, screaming, and the last thing Bill thinks before he slams the basement door is that what’s down there is a clown, a clown took his brother, and now it’s going to take him, too.

It’s crazy. But it’s _true_.

There’s something in Derry. Something terrible. Not a man, not a woman, not a he or a she.

An IT.

Georgie never does come home. But Bill still gets to see him, one last time.

The sewers are disgusting. There’s greywater everywhere. The stench is overpowering, the sounds frightening. No one should be down here, and with luck, no one will ever have to be again. It’s a bad place, an evil place.

But the monster who lives here is dead.

There’s seven of them. Seven Losers. Because what number is more powerful than seven?

Bill’s supposed to be their fearless leader, the one they all follow. And the evil may be vanquished, but Bill isn’t feeling very much like a _leader._

It’s over. IT is gone. They’ll never have to see Pennywise the Dancing Clown’s ugly face ever again.

But Georgie’s gone, too. For real this time.

His slicker is here, his stupid yellow slicker. Because IT couldn’t die without playing one more joke, without leaving one last piece of itself to haunt Bill forever.

Bill clutches the bright material in shaking hands, and falls to his knees.

He cries.

Bill Denbrough, Stuttering Bill, _Big Bill_, the fearless leader of the Losers Club, cries. Harder than he ever has in his life. Harder than he ever will. Because he’d held onto something before. Had kept hoping that Georgie was still out there, somewhere.

Now he knows. Now he knows Georgie can never come home.

And he cries. He cries until his throat is raw, and his face is red. He cries until he can’t breathe. He cries until he can’t cry anymore.

But he doesn’t cry alone. His friends are there, too. First Eddie. Then Bev. Ben, Mike, Stan, Richie. They crowd around him in a clump while he sobs, hold onto him, grab every part of him until there’s nothing left, fill in the spaces Bill so desperately needs to be filled.

Georgie would have loved to see Bill having so many friends who care about him so much.

And he’ll never see them. And Bill will never see him.

He never will.

Later, Bill makes a promise. Stanley picks up a green shard of Coke bottle with trembling fingers, tells them to swear that if IT isn’t dead, they’ll come back and finish the job. As a team. As a club.

Bill doesn’t even have to think about it. He wishes he could. But the answer was always going to be yes, no matter how much he doesn’t want it to be.

His palm stings as the glass pierces his skin, but he hardly notices it.

Maybe he deserves the pain.

He grasps Beverly’s hand on one side, Richie’s on the other. He swears.

He swears for all the little kids who’ll get hurt if IT comes back. He swears for the parents whose children will be torn away from them. He swears for the families that will fall apart, for the sons and daughters who will be ignored.

He swears for Eddie, still his best friend even after all this time.

He swears for Ben, because he’s everything a friend is supposed to be.

He swears for Mike, loyal to the people he loves no matter what.

He swears for Richie, a constant light in the dark.

He swears for Beverly, the girl he likes, despite what others say.

He swears for Stanley, the bravest of them all.

He swears for Georgie. Of course he does.

The others leave, one by one. And then it’s just Bill and Bev.

“You all p-packed for P-Portland?” Bill asks.

Beverly shrugs. “I guess I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.” She pauses. “I don’t think I want to leave.”

“Yeah,” Bill says, because _he _doesn’t want her to go. “B-But you’ll be a-a-alright there. I know you will b-be. You always are.”

“Thanks, Bill,” she says softly. She stands.

“I should probably go.”

“Yeah, p-probably. See you l-later, Bev.”

“Bye, Bill.”

And then she’s leaving.

She’s leaving, but Bill’s not ready for her to go.

He chases after her. Grabs her wrist and turns her around. He doesn’t even say anything. He just looks into her eyes, a silent question.

Beverly nods. And she bridges the divide.

Her lips are soft and her hand is warm against Bill’s cheek, and Bill doesn’t even care that she’s leaving streaks of blood all over his face, because she’s here, and she’s kissing him. She pulls back and gives Bill a sad smile, before she starts to lean in again.

The second time is better. It’s shorter than the first, but there’s something about it, something gentle in its intensity.

Bill wants more. But Beverly has to go.

So she does.

When Bill is fifteen years old, his family moves to Bangor.

He feels guilty, because he sort of _wants _to leave. He knows it will be the best thing for his family. This town holds too many bad memories for them, too many bad memories of Georgie.

Too many bad memories of the clown.

But Bill knows leaving will be hard. Leaving his friends isn’t something he can even fathom. And sure, he’ll call them, of course he will. But that’s exactly what Beverly had said before she moved, and they’ve never heard back from her.

At first Bill had thought that she was busy. But as the weeks dragged on with no news from her, he assumed she had moved on.

But how could she have?

Ben took it the hardest. In the first three months after she’d left, he’d waited every day after school by the phone that wouldn’t ring, and checked his mailbox religiously for a letter that would never be written. But after a while, he stopped. As far as the others can tell, he just gave up.

Bill has, too. He wishes he didn’t have to.

And no matter how cursed Derry may be, part of Bill never wants to leave. He was born here. He grew up here. He played here, he went to school here, he met his friends here, he had Georgie here, he kissed Bev here.

He also fought a clown here. His brother died here. Beverly left here.

Maybe going won’t be so bad.

But on his last day in town, with all of the Denbrough’s things packed away in a van and his bedroom stripped bare, with his friends there to say goodbye, Bill doesn’t want to leave.

“So,” Richie says, leaning against the side of the porch. “Who’s gonna replace Big Bill as the leader of the Losers Club once he’s gone?”

He says it as a joke, an attempt to add some lightheartedness to the situation, but Bill feels a lump in his throat, anyway.

“No one,” Mike says softly. “No one could.”

“I don’t know what we’re going to do without you, Bill,” Ben says.

Bill swallows. “Come on g-guys. You’ll be f-f-fine without me here. I’ll come b-back and visit, t-t-too. Over s-summer.” His voice breaks on the last word, and he winces.

“Bill,” Eddie says sadly, and it suddenly hits Bill that he’s leaving him behind. He’s leaving them all behind.

“I’m s-sorry,” he stammers, tears rolling down his face now, and the others crowd around him, envelop him, just like they had that day in the sewers.

“It’s not your fault,” Stan says thickly as he places a reassuring hand on Bill’s shoulder, but Bill knows it is. It’s his fault, it’s all his fault, and he’s a terrible friend. Why do they all like him so much? He’s so..._awful_.

“You’re _not_,” Richie says, even though Bill hadn’t said it out loud. They had just known what he was thinking.

Bill’s dad honks the horn. The others move back from him, slowly, all sniffling and wiping their eyes.

“See,” Bill says, voice choked with tears. “Even my dad is saying ‘Beep-beep, Richie.’”

The others laugh softly. Richie grins, though his eyes are red. “Big Bill gets off a good one. Wocka-wocka-wocka.”

“I’ll see you guys later,” Bill mumbles, looking at them all for what feels like the last time. “I’ll call you all.”

“You’d better,” Eddie says. But they all know he won’t. Bill knows it too, deep down. Beverly didn’t, so he won’t either.

He says goodbye one last time, and then he gets in the car, and he goes. The last thing he sees before they turn the corner is his friends, waving at him from his front porch.

Bill doesn’t stop crying until they cross the border out of town. Something about finally leaving Derry is cleansing. Healing, almost.

As they get on the highway, Bill starts to feel better. Better than he knows he’s felt in a long time. Like a big weight has been lifted off his shoulders.

He starts to forget why he was even sad in the first place. He’d moved, yeah. But was there something he was attached to where he used to live? Some people he loved?

He can’t remember it clearly. Only flashes, of kids he must have known. A boy with an inhaler, another with curly hair. One with big glasses and one that read books and one that worked on a farm, maybe? And a girl, a girl with red hair.

They must’ve been dreams. Maybe they were.

When they finally arrive at their new home in Bangor, Bill gets a good look inside. Kitchen. Dining room. Living room. Three bathrooms. Study. Master bedroom. Bedroom that will belong to Bill.

Another bedroom, a guest room. One that could belong to a little boy. A brother.

Georgie.

He can still remember Georgie.

“How do you like it, Billy?” his mother asks.

“It’s great. Really great,” Bill replies, any traces of the stutter he had once had long forgotten, not just by him, but by everyone.

When Bill is eighteen years old, he goes to college. He makes new friends there. All great, all nice. They’re there for Bill when he needs them, and help him when he’s struggling.

But -

Bill can’t help the feeling that something’s missing.

He sees boys with big glasses cracking up at jokes in the mess hall and has to resist the urge to laugh along, though he didn’t hear the punchline. Shorter students pass him in the halls, all brown hair and big eyes, and he feels like he knew someone like that, once. Kids in the library, poring over books, and Bill has to snap himself out of a memory he can’t call upon. Boys with kind eyes and gentle smiles and strong arms, who remind Bill of somebody, somebody he doesn’t know but wishes he could. His roommate is immaculately clean and precise about his work, and Bill finds comfort in that, not understanding why. He sees girls with red hair and bright smiles, and has brief flashes of déjá vu, or something like it.

He feels incomplete, but he doesn’t know _why._

Bill is twenty-five and he starts sending in short stories to newspapers. Stories about anything he can think of. He writes about a girl with ginger hair who could stop the world, and the publishers send it back. _Write something more personal_, they say. _Or write something big._

Bill thinks. He writes. A few of his stories get published. Little anecdotes about life, a couple of quick romances.

Something starts to itch in his brain, nagging at him. _Write about something you know_, it tells him. _Write about _fear.

Bill does. He’s twenty-six and he sends in a horror story, a brief one, about a boy in a yellow slicker who went missing on a rainy day. Just blew away, taken by someone. Taken by some_thing._

It’s an instant success. They want more. Bill writes more.

He’s thirty-one and he’s a novelist, a real one. People like his work. His editor praises the things he writes, no matter if he’s really putting effort in or not, and his books are bought by the bundle. They stop being featured in newspapers and start being featured in Hollywood. People want to make movies out of his stories. Bill makes more and more money every day.

He’s thirty-two when he meets Audra Phillips, and he falls in love. She tells him how much she liked his book, how she’s going to love playing the lead, and how she wouldn’t mind going out for coffee sometime. She smiles, warm and soft, when Bill says he wouldn’t mind that, either.

He’s thirty-seven, and he’s been married for a while. He keeps writing, keeps churning out best-sellers. Movies keep being made. Audra acts in some of them, Bill loves that she does. They move to England and get a goldfish and a terrier. Audra buys fancy clothes from Rogan and Marsh, and Bill tries to figure out why that name is so familiar to him. Audra laughs and says it’s probably because they’re successful, so Bill’s definitely heard of them before, of course he has. Bill grins and kisses her quick, Audra smiling against his lips. Life is wonderful.

Bill is content.

And then Bill is forty years old. And he’s ducking out of the studio for a quick second because his phone is ringing, the screen lighting up to tell him he’s got an incoming call from -

Derry, Maine.

Why does that name resonate with him the way it does?

“Hello?” Bill asks, not even sure why he’s answering. He doesn’t know anyone from Derry, Maine. But something had made him pick up the phone. _Something_ had, otherwise why would he be doing it?

“Bill Denbrough?” a voice says, a voice that seems so close, yet so far away.

“Yeah?” Bill knows that voice. He does.

“This is Mike. From Derry.”

“I’m sorry, I...I don’t think I know a Mike from - who are you?” Bill asks, but his heart is in his throat and he feels ice-cold.

“Mike Hanlon,” _Mike_ says, and then: “You need to come home.”

Bill’s palm stings.

He _remembers_.

IT’s gone. IT’s gone, and this time it’s _never _coming back.

And it took Eddie with it. And Stanley. Bill had only just remembered his best friends, and then they were gone. It isn’t fair.

And he’d remembered Georgie, too.

_God, _it isn’t _fair._

Silver (his old bike his old bike hi-yo silver away) is sturdy beneath him, but Audra’s arms are lax around his waist.

He hits the brakes, stopping by the corner store. He sets the bike on its kickstand, and gently lifts Audra off.

“Hey, honey,” he says quietly, stutter gone, _really _gone. “It’s ok. It’s gonna be ok. Can you talk to me?”

She shows no sign of having understood what he’d said. He’s not sure if she even heard him. She just stares blankly ahead, lips parted slightly.

“Ok,” Bill says shakily. “That’s alright. We’re gonna get you out of here. We’re gonna go home, ok? And it’s going to be ok.”

He guides her back onto the seat, and pulls her arms back around his hips. They hang there limply.

Bill pushes off, pedaling down the hills of his hometown. The hometown he forgot about until it came back to bite him in the ass.

He can remember riding around Derry as a kid. Before the clown. Before Georgie was killed. Stanley and Richie and Eddie following close behind, but never feeling as _free_ as Bill used to.

He pedals faster and faster, letting the wheels of good ol’ Silver take them all around the town. He ignores the odd glances he gets from the people walking, just zooms past, feeling as free as a bird.

He feels like a kid.

“HI-YO, SILVER, AWAY!” he shouts, and the glee in his voice is real. He wants to feel like this for the rest of his life, because if he did, he wouldn’t have to be afraid.

Audra’s arms twitch around him, once, twice. She gasps from behind him, hands quickly tightening around his waist.

“Bill!” she screams. “What the hell are we doing? Where _are_ we?”

Bill laughs then, tears streaming down his face as he does.

“Audra,” he yells back. “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” she says, and he can hear the smile in her voice. “But what the fuck is going on?”

Bill keeps flying around Derry, a place that is free of the evil it once held, full of people who can finally be happy, even if they have no idea of what had lurked beneath.

The demons are gone. The bad thing that used to infect the town is dead.

Sacrifices were made. Tears were shed. Friends are gone. But IT is no more.

And he realizes, as Audra shrieks with confused joy and adrenaline from behind him, that he’s alright.

Bill Denbrough has finally beaten the devil.

**Author's Note:**

> i had a lot of fun writing this and i'm thinking of making this into a series? i kind of want to write a study for each member of the losers club, but idk if i can stay motivated lmao. let me know if that's something you guys would be interested in, because if i decide to keep going with this, i think i'll do bev next.


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